Behind scenes, this group got the job done

Little did Suzanne Graham know when she boarded the plane for Puerto Vallarta Friday morning that she was setting out on a working vacation.

As it turned out, it was a good thing.

Amid the palms, pools and margaritas on the Mexican coast came the e-mail from back home in Charlotte County about a possible agreement to a highly controversial change in the county's zoning ordinances.

It was just what she was looking for, Graham said Tuesday. And after scrolling through the specifics on her Blackberry on the flight home, she was confident the proposal would fly with her fellow members of the DeSoto Charlotte Building Industry Association.

Tuesday's compromise agreement on the county's proposed planned development ordinance was hailed as "historic" by representatives from both sides of the aisle in this months-long-running fight. The environmentalist-types and the developer-types found that if they took a closer look at the issue, they weren't as far apart as the rhetoric often made it seem.

Maybe it's the economy, maybe it's the alignment of the stars or maybe it's more moderate personalities coming forward, but this sort of thing has been going around lately.

Earlier this year, a few slow-growth advocates got together behind closed doors with a few business people and reached a similar type of agreement over land-use issues in Sarasota County. The agreement, eventually approved by county commissioners, bypassed the traditional governmental process.

It now looks like lightning has struck a second time in Charlotte County.

Here's how it happened.

Last Thursday, Sue Reske of the Charlotte Harbor chapter of the Sierra Club phoned Graham about a possible compromise. Graham and Rob Humpel of the builders association then got together with Reske and Percy Angelo, an articulate opponent of the proposed PD change who lives on Cape Haze and is a candidate for a County Commission seat.

Neither side liked the ordinance that had been proposed and revised over the past few months. "It had become a hodgepodge," Humpel said, "so convoluted it was getting harder."

The four had been involved in county-run focus group meetings and saw room for agreement.

"We found that we weren't as far apart as we thought we were," Graham said.

Reske and Angelo wrote up a draft ordinance and sent it over to Humpel and Graham, who received it on her weekend getaway.

Angelo said they tried to make it simple. "It's a clear tradeoff," she said.

The essence is that it allows for more height in certain developments along the coast, which is what the builders wanted. It also clearly defines a specific trade -- additional open space -- for the extra height, which is what the environmental interests wanted.

E-mails and calls were exchanged through wider constituent groups on Monday. Positive response all around. By nightfall, all were agreed.

On Tuesday at 9 a.m., the principals and a handful of others met in the offices of land-use lawyer Rob Berntsson and, essentially, shook hands over morning coffee. An hour later, they presented their proposal to the commission.

Reske said this could be the start of something better. As she and Graham stood in the hall at the county building late Tuesday morning, she said the group is thinking about continuing "semi-formal" meetings in the future.

Maybe over margaritas.